The human brain

Aspects

physiology

Man is born out of the universe. The human brain is a picture of the heavens at birth, the structural organization of the brain maps to the starry heaven above one's birthplace.
- "our brain is really a picture of the heavens, and we each have a different picture depending on where and when we were born. ... No two people have the same brain. If we could take a picture of the entire brain with all of its details visible, we would get a different picture for each person. If we photographed a person's brain at the moment of birth and took a picture of the sky directly above his or her birthplace, the two pictures would be alike. The stars in the photograph of the sky would be arranged in the same way as certain parts of the brain in the other picture. (1911-06-08-GA015) - see Astrology#1911-06-08-GA015
the brain floats in cerebral fluid (CSF) and due to its etheric functioning has a strong upwards lifting force, which is why a brain of say 1500 gram only weights about 20 gram in a living human being (1924-02-02-GA234)

central white matter and surrounding grey matter (1924-07-24-GA319)
- grey matter: surrounds the white, is a substance which is far less delicately organised, much more connected with nutrition (.. and inner accumulation of substance)
- white matter: "is in a much greater degree a foundation for the spiritual"
soda and phosphorus are inside the human brain as necessary enablers for the thinking process (1923-10-20-GA351)

consciousness and thinking

'Man in the mirror'
- The brain works only as a reflecting apparatus, whereby it throws back the soul-activity and this becomes visible to itself. ... That the brain forms the thought ... is about as true as to say when one looks into a mirror that the mirror has 'made' the face. In fact, the face is outside the mirror; the mirror only reflects the face, throws it back. (1914-01-23-GA151 - see: Waking Consciousness#1914-01-23-GA151)
it's actually more complicated, see oa Human skeleton#Consciousness and thinking

pineal and pituitary glands

see Etherization of blood and oa Schema FMC00.354
Man's new organ: a new organ developed in the period between the 16 and 19th centuries, it is a gland in the brain above the root of Man's nose, that can be used to take in and let spiritual scientific knowledge work on Man's etheric body. This organ will develop in the future to faculties of clairvoyance and memory of earlier incarnations (Past life memories). If the organ is not used by people, it will give rise to terrible epidemics and nervous diseases far worse than any yet known to Man. (1913-05-01-GA152).

secretion of brain sand by pineal gland:
- "the pineal gland .. secretes out of itself the so-called brain sand, minute lemon-yellow stones which lie in little heaps at one end of the pineal gland, and which are the mineral element in the human head."(1923-10-28-GA230)
- in mental under-developed human beings, the pineal gland can be very small as these people cannot secrete the brain-sand required for normal I-consciousness development(1923-10-28-GA230)
- 1922-08-09-GA347 describes the process of continuous depositing and destruction of minerals ('brain-sand', more also in 1922-09-09/16-GA347) - see also Schema FMC00.513 on Spiritual scientific physiology

Illustrations

Lecture coverage and references

1909-04-19-GA264

notes from memory by Mathilde Scholl (in GA264)

Gabriel was the one who, in the 16th century, prepared the human brain through selected births so that an organ was formed therein (to be sure, not perceptible to investigation by natural science), which nevertheless makes the present-day brain appear different from that of a person of the 13th or 14th centuries.
The human brain has undergone a distinct change since the 16th century and has the purpose of enabling humanity eventually to understand Christianity in its full significance.
..
as a result of the preparation accomplished by Gabriel in the 16th century, of a new organ in the frontal globe of the human brain, it became possible during the last third of the 19th century for what we call spiritual science to be infused by the White Lodge so that the significance of the Mystery of Golgotha could be brought home to humanity in all its implications. When a person now crosses the threshold at earth it is possible for each human being to discover his or her own great Master, now available to anyone in a living physical body who seeks him.

1914-01-23-GA151

full extract see: Waking Consciousness#1914-01-23-GA151

[the Man in the mirror]
The uncompromising materialist of our day finds it suits his purpose to say that the brain forms the thought — more exactly, that the central nervous system forms the thought.
For anyone who sees through things, this is about as true as to say when one looks into a mirror that the mirror has “made” the face.
In fact, the face is outside the mirror; the mirror only reflects the face, throws it back.
The experience a Man has of his thoughts is quite similar.
(We will leave aside for the moment other aspects of the soul.) The experience of real, active thinking no more arises from the brain than the image of a face is created by the mirror. The brain, in fact, works only as a reflecting apparatus, whereby it throws back the soul-activity and this becomes visible to itself. The brain has as little to do with what a Man perceives as thoughts as a mirror has to do with your face when you see it in a glass. But there is something more than that. When someone thinks, he really perceives only the last phases of his thinking-activity, of his thinking experience.
And now, in order to make this clear, I want to take up once more the comparison with the mirror.

1922-08-09-GA347

describes the process of continuous depositing and destruction of minerals

1922-09-09-GA347

1922-09-16-GA347

1923-10-20-GA351

If we examined the nerves which go out from the brain, then again the most important substance in these nerves is soda and phosphorus. Only that they are connected with each other in a different way than this seed is, that they are, so to speak, hardened with each other.
It is not at all wonderful that out of the human being also such a thing arises, which is thought. By taking over what otherwise lies only in the seed, Man processes soda and phosphorus in the nervous system.
Just as outside in the world there is phosphorus and hydrogen everywhere, so soda and phosphorus are inside in this human brain sphere.
But now you can see why we need the carbonic acid inside the head. It is because the soda is continually being converted. The carbonic acid separates from the sodium, and in the end we would get a hard skull from the sodium - which is a silvery metal - if the carbonic acid did not continuously tingle in us and the soda was not produced in us. So we absorb the carbonic acid into the sodium, so that the soda is correctly distributed in our head.
And from what is all around us, through the hair, through the skin, we absorb phosphorus, hydrogen.

1923-10-28-GA230

And when this mineral substance disintegrates, a power of the highest order takes hold of just these products of mineral disintegration and from them builds up new worlds. The mineral element in any particular place can become of all things the most important.
When we follow the course of Earth-stage of evolution — warmth-condition, air-condition, water-condition, mineral-earthly condition — the human head has participated in all these metamorphoses, the mineral metamorphosis being the first to work outwards in the disintegrating skeleton of the head — though it still retains a certain vitality. But this human head has participated in the earthly-mineral metamorphosis in a way which is even more apparent.
[secretion of brain sand by pineal gland]
In the centre of the human head within the structure of the brain there is an organ shaped like a pyramid, the pineal gland. This pineal gland, situated in the vicinity of the corpus quadrigemina and the optic thalamus secretes out of itself the so-called brain sand, minute lemon-yellow stones which lie in little heaps at one end of the pineal gland, and which are in fact the mineral element in the human head. If they do not lie there, if Man does not bear this brain-sand, this mineral element, within him, he becomes an idiot or a cretin. In the case of normal people the pineal gland is comparatively large. In cretins pineal glands have been found which are actually no larger than hemp seeds; these cannot secrete the brain-sand.

It is actually in this mineral deposit that the spirit-man is situated; and this already indicates that what is living cannot harbour the spirit, but that the human spirit needs the nonliving as its centre-point, that this is above all things necessary to it as independent living spirit.

1924-02-02-GA234

The human brain floats in cerebral fluid and due to its etheric functioning and nature has a strong upwards lifting force. This is why a brain of say 1500 gram only weights about 20 gram in a living human being, this upthrust is an example of the etheric forces.

1924-07-24-GA319

[in context of treatment of migraine]
In the head-organisation we observe, first of all, the continuations of the sense-nerves which are most wonderfully intertwined and interwoven. The nerves as they continue on into the centre of the brain from the senses, form a marvellous structure. It represents the highest point of perfection in respect of the physical organisation, for there the I of man impresses the most intense form of its activity upon the physical body. The way in which the nerves pass inwards from the senses and are linked together, bringing about something like an inner articulation within the organism, places the human organism at a much higher level than the animal. And it is possible, just because the I-organisation must take hold at this point in order to control this marvellous structure, that it may occasionally fail and then that part of the physical organisation gets left to itself. It may happen that the I-organisation is not powerful enough to permeate this so-called “white matter” of the brain or to organise it thoroughly.
Now the white matter of the brain is surrounded by the grey matter — a substance which is far less delicately organised but which is indeed regarded by ordinary physiology as being the more important of the two. This it is not, for the reason that it is connected much more with nutrition. We have a far more mobile activity in respect of nutrition — of inner accumulation of substance — in the grey brain-matter, than in the white matter which lies in the middle and which in a much greater degree is a foundation for the spiritual.
Now everything in the human organism belongs together, for every member works upon every other.
Directly, therefore, that the I begins to withdraw to some extent from the central — the white brain-substance — the grey matter becomes disordered. The astral body and the etheric body can no longer take proper hold of the grey matter; and so the whole of the interior of the head gets out of order.
The I-organisation withdraws from the central brain, the astral organisation withdraws more from the periphery of the brain; and the whole organisation of the head is dislocated.
The central brain begins to be less serviceable for the forming of concepts, more akin to the grey matter, developing a kind of digestive process which it ought not to do; the grey matter begins to unfold an excessively strong digestive process.
And then foreign bodies are absorbed; a strong excretory process permeates the brain. All this reacts upon the finer breathing processes, principally, however, upon the rhythmic processes of the blood-circulation. Thus we get, not perhaps a very deeply penetrating, but still a very significant disorder arising in the human organism and the question is:
How are we to restore the I-organisation to the system of nerves and senses?
How are we to drive the I back again to the place it has left — into the central part of the brain ?
This we can do if we administer a substance of which I spoke in the earlier lectures, namely, silicic acid. If, however, we were to give only silicic acid, we should, it is true, send back the I into the central nerves-and-senses system in the head, but we should leave the surrounding part, i.e., the grey matter of the brain, untouched.
Thus we must at the same time so regulate the digestive process of the grey matter that it no longer ' overflows,' that it incorporates itself rhythmically into the whole organisation of the human being. Therefore we must simultaneously administer iron — which is there in order to regulate these connections — so that the rhythmic organisation shall be placed once more in its right relation to the system lying at the basis of spiritual activity.

Discussion

Related pages

References and further reading

John Eccles, Daniel N. Robinson: 'The wonder of being human : our brain and our mind' (1985)
Klaus Jensen: 'Gehirn und Denken : Beiträge zum Leib-Seele- Problem' (1995)
Jens Heisterkam (Urs Pohlmann et al.): 'Geist und Gehirn : Beiträge zu einem monistischen Verständnis' (1999)
Andreas Neider (Gerald Hüther et al.): 'Wer strukturiert das menschliche Gehirn? : Fragen der Hirnforschung an das Selbstverständnis des Menschen' (2006)